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A review of Stepped Impedance Resonators in Microwave circuits

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 National Conference on Computing, Communication & Electrical Systems
December 2017 - Proceedings

A review of Stepped Impedance Resonators in

Microwave circuits
1
Rupali,2Rajni
1
M.Tech. Student, Department of Electronics and Communication
SBSSTC, Ferozepur, India.
rupalipr99h@gmail.com
2
Professor , Department of Electronics and Communication
SBSSTC, Ferozepur, India.
rajni_c123@yahoo.co.in

Abstract - Wireless Communication Technology plays vital role in modern world. The demand for small, compact low cost and
reduced size and multiband applications in both military and commercial sphere has increased day by day. Multiband operation and
miniaturization are the major issues of Multi-standard wireless system which leads to handheld systems with enhanced portability and a
smaller amount of electromagnetic interference. Stepped Impedance Resonator (SIR) Technique is also one of the novel methods that
contribute in achieving multiband frequency functionality and miniaturization. This paper presents a review of types of SIR and
employment of SIR in microwave circuits.

Keywords - Stepped Impedance Resonator, Variable length Transmission line, Uniform Impedance Resonator, Hairpin
The miniaturization has remained a parameter of
concern in designing of band pass filters. The Hairpin
1. Introduction band pass filters have been designed to provide
compaction comparatively [1]. In order to minimize the
The advent of wireless technology has eye witnessed size even further, modified Stepped Impedance Resonators
economical and low power handling circuits imprinted on (SIR) has been anticipated by researchers in different areas
dielectric substrate. This has led to production of light of electronics. SIR is made up of two transmission lines
weight and less power handling components. Hence, the having unlike lengths and characteristic impedance that
multi-standard wireless system has demanded paradigm operates above the VHF band. The SIRs have been found
shift in the resonator design to be functional at multiband suitable in designing of microstrip band pass filters with
frequency. The Planar resonators are important in low good stop band performance [2-5].The SIRs are also used
power applications. High valued Q resonators were to shift or suppress the higher order frequencies [6]. The
popular for oscillators and filter application because of the special property of SIR is its tuning with resonant
inherent narrow bandwidth of the components. But frequency adjusting the impedance ratio of the high-Z and
Stepped Impedance Resonator (SIR) is the reasonable low-Z segments.
expansion to Uniform Impedance Resonator (UIR), a This paper is planned in six sections. Section 1gives the
simplest resonator. SIR has embossed a position in planar importance of use of SIR in microwave circuits followed
circuit design and has been proved as an alternate to UIR by Section 2which describes theory and concept of SIR.
which was used for various filter applications since past Section 3 describes the types of SIR and Section 4 presents
few decades. SIR was first introduced by Makimoto and technological trends of SIR. Section 5 concludes the
Yamashita in 1980s [1-2]. The fascinating feature about reported work.
Stepped Impedance Resonator is that it was introduced to
move the higher spurious bands without perturbing the
fundamental frequency along with multiband operation. 2. Stepped Impedance Resonator
The concurrent usage of multimode wireless systems over
the years has augmented the demand and has put extra Stepped Impedance Resonator (SIR) can be considered as
restrain on designers. Consequently, the modifications in two transmission lines of different lengths and
the design resulted in a flexible option of resonators. characteristic impedance. Its design parameters are
Conventional filters like parallel-coupled lines and controlled by both length and impedance ratio. The current
hairpin filters are implemented in multiple stage density along the transmission line can be controlled by
configurations. However the size of the circuit is colossal. the alternating segments of high and low characteristics

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impedance lines. Due to its high Q-factor and compactness, 3. Types of SIR
it has been employed in filters, oscillators and mixers.
SIR has three main types that can be employed in the
composite transmission line as fundamental structure of
transmission line namely: half wave, quarter wave and one
wave.

3.1 λg/4 or Quarter-Wave SIR

For application-oriented viewpoint, the λg /4 type SIR is

the most attractive among various types of SIR. When
quarter is compared with the half wave structure in the
Fig. 1 Structural variations of (a) Uniform Impedance Resonator (UIR) same frequency response then the dimension of quarter
(b) Capacitor loaded UIR (c) Stepped- Impedance Resonator (SIR) [1]. wave is small, which can be used in the design of band
pass filter. It is also noteworthy that reducing a size and
The aim of development of SIR was to overcome the conceal of harmonic response. By using practical design
limitations like limited design parameter and spurious examples using air-cavity type and dielectric-type coaxial
responses etc. of Uniform Impedance Resonator (UIR) and SIR are introduced.The fundamental structure of Quarter-
Capacitor loaded UIR. Figure 1 depicts the structural Wave SIR is displayed in Fig. 2.
variations of (a) UIR, (b) Capacitor loaded UIR and (c)
SIR.
The condition of resonance for SIR signal is given by

(1)
Where Z1 is the impedance of narrow section, Z2 is the
impedance of wider section and θ1 and θ2 are the electric
lengths of narrow and wider sections having characteristic Fig. 2.Basic Structure of λg/4-Type SIR [1].
impedance Z1and is given by
3.2 λg/2 or Half-Wave SIR
(2)
In half-wave SIR, SIR is composed of a strip line
From equation (1), is given by configuration, working in millimetre-wave band which
may be beneficial for reducing the insertion loss. Figure 3
(3) shows the basic structure of Half-Wave SIR.

And θT is the total electrical length of the transmission line

and is given by

(4)

θT is minimum when

(5)
Fig. 3 Basic Structure of λg/2-Type SIR [2].

Using equations (2) and (5)we get

Typical the structural variations of λg /2 type SIR are
Straight type, Hairpin type, Ring type, Hairpin type with
(6) internal coupling and Ring type with internal coupling and
are shown in Fig. 4.
for0 <K < 1, we get the minimum line length of the
resonator.

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In 2005, tri-section SIR with short and low impedance

section installed in usual two section SIR structure [10].
Further, in 2008, three arbitrarily specified resonant
frequencies, the impedance ratios of an equal electric
length tri band transceiver (TR-SIR) can be calculated
using a simple set of formulas, without help of any
designed graph [11].

Fig. 4 Structural variations of half wave SIR (a) Straight type, (b) Hairpin
type, (c) Ring type, (d) Hairpin type coupling, (e) Ring type coupling [2].

3.3 One-Wave SIR

In one-wave SIR, SIR is formed by use of micro-stripline,

slot line or stripline structure. It has slow radiation loss
characteristics and also has an ability to eliminate the
parasitic components. In short-circuit and open-circuit,
these components can be easily induced with quarter wave Fig. 6 Tri-Section SIR [11].
and half wave [1]. The elementary structure of one-wave .
SIR is presented in Fig. 5. 3.5 Coupled SIR

The coupled SIR is used to replace two dual-band baluns

combining with a single ended dual-band filter, or two
single band balanced band pass filter in balanced RF front-
end. With eight quarter wavelength type coupled SIRs in
the balanced dual band filter provides the required
differential mode dual band response. Further in 2007, SIR
was designed for a new fourth-order balanced BPF to get
the desired differential mode performance [12].

3.6 Pseudo-Interdigital SIR

Fig. 5 Basic Structure of λg-Type SIR [1].
The cascaded open-stub structure is employed to achieve
There are two orthogonal resonance modes within a 1-λ the dual band BPF and result in large size and circuit
ring resonator. They have been applied to filtering devices complexity [13]. A pseudo-interdigital SIRs (PI-SIRs) [14]
using these two modes [7-8]. The practical application of was introduced in 2007 to attain tuned impedance ratio
this dual-mode ring resonator can be divided into two and good transmission performance [15].
approaches; the first approach is by independently
operating the two orthogonal modes in 4-port devices, the 3.7 Ka-Band SIR
second approach is to utilize an internal coupling between
the two degenerate modes for 2-port devices [9].
A new coupling structure is proposed to increase the
coupling coefficient which overcomes the limitation of
3.4 Tri-Section SIR fabricating craft in millimeter-wave band having Ka-band
filter. Planar filters are normally used in frequency band
Tri-Section SIR consists of three different characteristics below the Ka-band. The problem of pool coupling from
impedances sections Z1, Z2 and Z3 as depicted in Fig. 6. the feed port to SIR structure is solved by applying Ka
There are a number of ways to design multi-band filters, band [16].
for example filters cascade, filters paralleled that have
been exhibited including SIR, dual mode resonators,
meandered open loop resonators, and photonic bandgap 4. Technological Trends in SIR
structures.

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4.1 Band pass filter using coaxial SIR

Filters are the most typical applications of SIR, and the

design methods for such filters vary in accordance with the
SIR structure. For example, a direct-coupled multistage
band pass filter consists of a λg /4- type SIR as a unit
resonant element. Various coupling methods such as
capacitive, inductive, and electromagnetic coupling can be
adapted to this filter. When performing filter synthesis
using distributed-element resonators like SIR, the
Fig.8Basic structure of a double coaxial SIR (DC-SIR) [18].
resonators are usually expressed as electrically equivalent
lumped-element components approximated at the
resonance frequency. This lumped-element approximation
is valid only in the frequency band near resonance. In
designing a band pass filter, one must keep in mind that
although an accurate estimation can be obtained for
frequency responses near pass-band, this approximation
cannot be applied to calculate response at the stop-bands
far from centre frequency. The synthesis method of this
filter, originally proposed by S.B. Cohn [17] is slightly
modified to meet with SIR structure and is shown in Fig.
7. Fig.9 Photograph of duplexer using DC-SIRs [18].

4.3 Push-Push Oscillator

The push-push oscillator consists of two identical negative

resistance circuits that are separately connected to the two
open-ends of the SIR, realizing two oscillating circuits that
operate at uniform frequency while possessing a reverse
phase [19]. Figure 10 illustrates the basic circuit structure
based on a hairpin-shaped SIR. This oscillating circuit is
composed of two negative circuits and one SIR, and this
Fig. 7 band pass filter [17]. configuration enables single operation of each oscillator as
well as simultaneous operation of the two oscillators. Due
4.2 Double Coaxial SIR (DC-SIR) to nonlinear operations, the output signal of a typical
oscillator contains various high level harmonics other than
Anti-vibration characteristics of this SIR structure are the fundamental component. Although the output signals
insufficient for practical use due to a heavy weight at the of the two oscillators show reverse phase for the
end of the centre conductor. The inner area of the centre fundamental component, for the second harmonics they
conductor contains no electromagnetic field, meaning that operate in common phase. This makes it possible to
the space is not effectively used for increasing the Q value. combine the power of the second harmonics by applying
As is apparent from the definition of unloaded-Q, the an in-phase hybrid, while simultaneously suppressing the
effective use of space within the resonator becomes critical fundamental component. Consequently, this configuration
for the enhancement of the Q value, because can be applied to realize a high efficiency osciplier, which
electromagnetic energy within an air-cavity type resonator is an oscillator with a multiplier function that does not
is stored in the space enclosed by the inner and outer need an output filter. By contrast, by applying a 180
conductors. To overcome these problems, a DC-SIR degree hybrid the fundamental signals of the two
(double coaxial SIR) which adopts a double coaxial oscillators can be combined while suppressing the second
structure at the tip of the centre conductor [18]. harmonics. Oscillator phase noise reduction near
resonance can effectively be realized with this
configuration, for, while the power of both oscillators are
amplified, the lower frequency noise components which

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are mixed into both oscillators in common phase are can be replaced by a combination of transmission lines,
cancelled by the 180° hybrid. allowing new features while maintaining the advantages of
a conventional SIR structure. An example of this resonator
type is the folded-line resonator [20], which can be
considered as one of the expanded concepts of the basic
SIRs. Figure 13 shows a folded line SIR structure with
basic SIR in (a), its equivalent circuit in (b) and folded line
SIR in (c) to enable miniaturization. The electrical
performance of this resonator structure is equivalent to the
conventional SIR however achieves further
miniaturization, Furthermore, to obtain an accurate
resonance frequency estimation, effects of the T-junction
Fig.10 Basic circuit configuration of the experimental push-push and right-angle bends must be accurately calculated, thus
oscillator [1].
requiring electromagnetic analysis based on methods such
as the finite-element method.

Fig. 11 Photograph of the experimental push-push oscillator [1].

4.4 Multistep SIR and Tapered-Line Resonators

The multistep resonator approaches a tapered-line

resonator at extreme conditions by increasing the step
number. Despite a scientific interest asan object of
Fig. 13 λg /2 type SIR as folded line SIR. (a) Basic SIR; (b) an equivalent
analytical study, the multistep resonator seems to possess circuit of (a); and (c) A folded-line SIR [3].
little availability for practical use when compared with
conventional two-step SIR. Figure 12 shows Multistep SIR
and Tapered-Line Resonators with varying number of
steps.
4.6 Split Ring Resonators

Fig.12 Multi-stepped impedance resonators and linear tapered-line

resonator [1].

4.5 Folded-Line SIR

The basic structure of SIR is composed of serial-connected

plural transmission lines with different characteristic Fig. 14 represents SIR based spiral resonator [24].
impedance. A single transmission line in a SIR structure

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25. Rupali and Rajni, “Analysis of resonant behaviour of Fractal

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Rupali is a student at SBS State Technical Campus, Ferozepur

(Punjab) (India). She has doneher B.Tech from IKG P.T.U,
Jalandhar, India. Her area of interest includes Antenna design.

Dr. Rajni is currently Professor at SBS State Technical Campus,

Ferozepur (Punjab) (India). She has done Ph.D. from SLIET,
Longowal. She has completed her M.E. from NITTTR, Chandigarh,
India, B.Tech. from NIT, Kurukshetra, India. She has about
Nineteen years of academic experience and two years Industrial
experience. Her areas of interest include Wireless communication
and Antenna design

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